Conventions are increasingly becoming more and more of a celebration of geek fashion and this year’s Star Wars Celebration was no exception. There was a geek fashion vendor down almost every other aisle and they were offering far more than just the standard t-shirts that used to be the hallmark and the unfortunate extent of geek “fashion.” As everyone knows, that changed about seven years ago when Her Universe launched and fans haven’t looked back since. Thankfully.
We already brought you an up close look at the Musterbrand and Po-Zu booths but they were far from the only non-t-shirt vendors. Loungefly, ThinkGeek, and WeLoveFine all had a strong presence (and very busy booths.) Her Universe was equally busy… or at least that’s my best guess. Unfortunately, their booth was inside the Celebration store which was an approximately 5 hour endeavor if you wanted to buy something. (2+ hours wait to get in and another 2+ to check out… ridiculous is a kind term for it.) At least now the Celebration collection is available via the Her Universe and Hot Topic websites.
There were a few geek fashion related panels. The Kessel Runway presented a geek fashion panel on the Collectors track. The biggest announcements came from the Disney Parks panel where Her Universe revealed their new line that will be coming exclusively to the parks. The collection leans a little more vintage/retro (especially with the poodle skirts) but that’s not surprising given some of Disney’s more recent fashion releases. There is also a Rey vest/arm warmer combo and a Padmé and Leia shirt that looks intriguing. You can see all the designs at the above link. Personally, I’m most interested in the Tatooine dress and the BB-8 hoodie because that just looks COMFY.
It wasn’t hard to find the Musterbrand booth at Star Wars Celebration this year… all you had to do was follow the sound of excitement and backtrack those walking away with some fabulous jackets in hand. Every time I walked by their booth, they were quite busy with plenty of fans, both men and women, interested in their line of high quality jackets and sweaters and for good reason. They make a damn good product. One of my con roommates even happily walked away with their incredible TIE pilot inspired leather jacket.
I’d previously purchased their Cassian Andor jacket and honestly haven’t been able to shut up about how much I love it to people both online and in real life. Frankly, it was fantastic to see how many people were not only interested in Musterbrand’s line but also happy to spend the money for quality work. It also helps that I cannot say enough good things about the people working the Musterbrand booth all weekend as they were all incredibly nice and helpful and made the booth a lovely place to visit. If you ever have a chance to stop by their booth at a convention, I absolutely recommend doing so.
While they were only on display on Thursday, Musterbrand’s newest offerings were the talk of certain circles at the convention. In the very near future, they’ll be officially debuting their first line of shoes with some fantastic Star Wars inspired designs. [Editor’s Note: The Skywalker and Darth Vader sneakers have been put online for preorder.] The designs range from the slightly more obvious to the more subtly nerdy inspired. My personal favorites are the Leia inspired flat and the Rebel pilot sneaker as they’re not quite like anything we’ve seen on the market thus far. Having gotten my hands on the shoes, I can personally attest to the quality. Musterbrand has put the same amount of thought and care into their shoes that they’ve put into their jackets which makes for a winning combination. (Stay tuned for a closer look at the sneakers in the coming weeks…)
During the convention, Musterbrand’s founder and CEO Knut Bergel was kind enough to chat with me about Musterbrand’s start, the design process, and what we might see in the future. The transcript of our conversation is below: (more…)
It’s a sign of how great Hero Within is that we’ve featured them twice within a year. (We just keep tripping and featuring men’s geek fashion…) On Monday, they announced their brand new Justice League Summer Collection including some fantastic button-down shirts and an even better denim Wonder Woman jacket. The collection is currently available for preorder with expected delivery in May. If you’re attending Wonder Con this weekend, they’ll have samples on hand for you to try on and see in person. You can shop their collection on the Hero Within site.
Also worth noting is the blog post their CEO Tony B Kim wrote in regards to the hate slung their way by some people because of the Wonder Woman jacket. Let’s all remember that geek fashion is for everybody and that everyone should be able to wear geek gear featuring their favorite characters regardless of gender. I most definitely applaud Tony Kim for confronting this hate head on and reaffirming that there’s nothing wrong with men wearing a Wonder Woman jacket.
We don’t usually cover men’s fashion here but for these ThinkGeek jackets, we had to make an exception! Check out their brand new Hero Within collection. While there is also an okay Flash sweatshirt and a decent enough Green Lantern jacket, the real standouts are the Batman pieces. All three jackets (a blazer and two peacoats) have the bat logo cleverly hidden on the back via the seam lines as you can see below:
The inside lining is yellow with a far less Batman logo but as far as the outside is concerned, this is a perfect subtly nerdy piece! While we haven’t gotten our hands on any of these and can’t say for certain, the higher price point is a promising sign regarding the quality and it would definitely be worth ordering to see for sure if you’re interested.
You can see all three of the Batman offerings below and shop the entire Hero Within collection over at ThinkGeek.com!
If you hadn’t seen it already, Kohl’s recently debuted a really neat Rogue One inspired collection. I swung by one of their stores a few weeks ago to check it out (and tweeted my experience with the entire collection) and ended up buying a few pieces. A holiday brunch was a great excuse to wear the jumpsuit for the first time!
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Imperial Stars Jumpsuit: Kohl’s
Imperial Cog Necklace: The Colorful Geek
Silver Earrings: Ralph Lauren
Black Pumps: BCBG
